Alanna Rizzo was the first. First to cover the Rockies and first to hit baseball’s big time.

Then it was Jenny Cavnar’s turn. Then Taylor McGregor’s.

Three Colorado natives who built their reputations and carved their career paths at Coors Field. Three hard-working women who’ve made their mark in sports broadcasting. Three friends.

“It’s so special to see how it all played out,” said Cavnar, the Smoky Hill High School and Colorado State graduate who returned to Coors this weekend as a history-making television play-by-play announcer for the Athletics.

“And to think that it all started from one tiny phone call all those years ago,” Cavnar continued. “It’s amazing, the chain reaction it caused, giving us all a chance to chase our dreams.”

Covering big-league baseball was their launch pad and proving ground in a business that can still be tough on women.

“There are a lot of people who get into this industry thinking they want to be famous, and there are people who get into it because they just want to be on television,” said Rizzo, a graduate of Colorado Springs’ Sierra High School and the University of Colorado. “Those people find themselves out of the business very quickly. But for the three of us, the linear thing we share, our commonality, is our work ethic. Baseball is a day-to-day grind. You can’t fake it in baseball.”

Their resumes are impressive.

Rizzo, 49, left the Rockies after the 2011 season for a national role at MLB Network. In 2013, she moved on again, becoming the in-game reporter for Spectrum SportsNet LA, covering the Dodgers for seven years (including three World Series) in the country’s second-biggest TV market. In July 2021, she was part of Major League Baseball’s first all-women broadcast team for a game between the Orioles and Rays.

For four years, she worked on “High Heat,” teaming with Chris “Mad Dog” Russo until MLB Network canceled the show last November.

McGregor, 32, the Rockies’ sideline reporter in 2018-19, joined ESPN as a college football sideline reporter in September 2019 and became the Cubs’ lead reporter for Marquee Sports Network in Chicago in 2020.

Before the 2024 season, Cavnar, 42, left the Rockies to become the primary play-by-play announcer for the Oakland A’s TV broadcasts. She became the first woman to hold that position in major league history.

Now, about that phone call.

Cavnar was a young TV reporter, covering the Padres in San Diego. But the station was folding, and she was in career limbo.

“I didn’t know about my baseball future, but then I get this call from Rizzo one day and she tells me she’s going to MLB Network,” said Cavnar, who calls her friend by her last name because it’s what CSU and CU rivals do.

“She said, ‘I’m sure the job with (the Rockies) is yours if you want it. You should call Ken Miller (then the executive producer for Root Sports Rocky Mountain).’

“I called Ken, and I got the job with the Rockies. I probably would never have left San Diego at all — it’s an amazing place — unless it was to return to Colorado.”

Fast forward to the winter of 2019. McGregor was offered a job to move to Chicago and cover the Cubs. The decision tormented her. After all, the Golden High School graduate was covering her hometown team. Her father, Keli McGregor, was the Rockies’ team president until his sudden death from a heart infection in 2010. The ties that bind her to the Rockies are strong.

“So, Taylor comes into the office in tears, in a puddle of tears, and says, ‘I don’t know what to do,‘” Cavnar recalled. “She said, ‘I have this job offer from Chicago and the Cubs are starting this network. What should I do?’”

Cavnar and Alison Vigil, the producer for Rockies TV, couldn’t help but laugh.

“We told Taylor, ‘We are kicking you out of the nest — you are so gone,’” Cavnar said. “It was emotional for her, understandably so. But she ultimately had to make the leap, like we all did. I love that thread with all of us.

“It started with Alanna. She had to take that leap and take a chance on her dreams instead of saying, ‘This is comfortable, and Colorado is a place I could live forever, but I have to see where I go.’ She went on to amazing things. She covered the Dodgers and became a national brand in the game.”

McGregor, who emerged as one of ESPN’s high-profile reporters during the College Football Playoff this past season, is grateful for the two women who paved the way.

“I have been asked, so many times, ‘What’s it like to be a woman in sports?’” McGregor said. “And I have said, ‘We are standing on the shoulders of giants. And Jenny and Alanna are two of the giants that came before me.’

“I was able to come to Colorado and demand respect from fellow media members because of the women that had come before me. If Jenny and Alanna hadn’t been professional and didn’t know what they were doing, my experience with the Rockies would have been completely different.”

All three women credit their time at 20th and Blake with preparing them for bigger things. McGregor, who earned her degree from the University of Arkansas, worked at THV-11 in Little Rock, Ark., and KCWY-TV in Wyoming before returning to Colorado. Covering baseball was different and taught her to think on her feet.

“Experience in this business is the greatest teacher,” she said. “In local TV news, it was so different. You are given a teleprompter, and your 45 seconds are pretty much scripted out.

“So the biggest learning curve for me was in-game reporting. Being able to ad-lib was such a steep learning curve for me. I thought I knew baseball when I took the job. Then, I realized I knew nothing. Now, still, every single day, I feel like I’m learning about the sport. I liked baseball when I started, but I fell in love with it because of how intricate the game is. It still really challenges me.”

For Cavnar, the Athletics’ 2024 season was like getting knocked down by a fastball, high and inside. But she got up, dusted herself off and kept going.

Not only was she the first full-time female play-by-play announcer in MLB history, but she was also calling games for a franchise in turmoil. The Athletics’ quest to secure a new stadium in the Oakland area repeatedly failed, so they gave up and sought greener grass in Las Vegas, where they plan to move for the 2028 season. The 2024 season was the final one after 57 years in Oakland. Now, the team is simply called the Athletics, even though it will spend the next three years playing at a minor league park in West Sacramento, Calif.

“Last year, I was calling games for a fan base that was beyond angry, and rightfully so,” Cavnar said. “I mean, they have lost every single sports team in the East Bay in the last five years. They lost the Raiders to Las Vegas and then lost the Warriors to a shiny new toy and a new arena in San Francisco. And then they lost the A’s, who had hopes of a new stadium lingering for more than a decade.

“I walked into a hornet’s nest, for sure. I am also trying to figure out myself. There were so many challenges that could not be foreseen. I don’t care who took this job, it would have been tough to find success.”

Cavnar and her husband, Steve, a Denver firefighter, are parents to two young children. They stayed at home while Mom became a baseball trailblazer.

When she’s on the road and needs support, Cavnar reaches out on a text chain that includes baseball broadcast veterans Amy Gutierrez (Giants), Jody Jackson (Diamondbacks), Sophia Minnaert (Brewers), Emily Jones (Rangers) and Rizzo.

“Last year, I felt the loneliest I have ever felt in this job, but also the most supportive,” Cavnar said. “The game has given me so many wonderful friendships and a sisterhood that I couldn’t do without. We have known each other for a really long time. We help each other in the hard times and celebrate each other in the great times.”

Added Rizzo: “We celebrate all of our victories, but we also share things that have made this job challenging. We’ll share some of the ignorant direct messages we get. Such things as people saying we are old, ugly, or ignorant about sports. Or that our hair looks awful. That we need to lose weight. We share the highs and lows.”

The Colorado trio has dealt with enormous pressure in a competitive field. McGregor admits that jumping from the Rockies to the Cubs was scary, and jumping from baseball to national college football was even more unnerving.

“I had my most high-profile year this past season,” she said. “I got bumped up and (covered) the college football playoffs for the first time. Right before the Texas-Clemson game, my boss told me, ‘We’re expecting 15 million viewers.’

“I was like, ‘Don’t tell me that!’ I have never been more nervous than I was before that game, just because I knew that the numbers were going to be monstrous, and it was going to be the biggest game I had ever covered. At the same time, this is what I want to do. I never had any hesitation about taking a challenge of being on a bigger stage.”

Rizzo’s career began on a tiny stage. Bored with her job in business, she went back to CU and earned a master’s degree in journalism at age 28. Her first sports broadcasting job was in Wichita Falls, Texas, the 182nd-largest market in the U.S., in 2003. She moved on to Madison, Wis., before coming home just in time for Rocktober in 2007.

“It was right in the middle of that crazy run when they rattled off 21 wins in 22 games,” she recalled. “I didn’t know anybody or much of anything, and really not much about baseball. I didn’t get to go to the World Series. I was the low woman on the totem pole. I was just a freelancer, getting my feet wet.”

Her baseball education was just getting started.

“In 2008, Aaron Cook was the Rockies’ ace, and I didn’t know what a sinkerball pitcher was,” Rizzo said with a laugh. “I was very, very green. I didn’t grow up wanting to cover baseball. I grew up a Broncos fan and a CU Buffs fan.

“But the Rockies were my opportunity, and it was the greatest move I ever made. I have grown to love baseball. As Minnie Minoso once said, ‘Baseball’s been very, very good to me.’”